“Welcome to Europa recruits” Corporal sarcastically remarked, as we neared the green and blue orb floating around Jupiter. As the 15 of us squeezed next to each other to get a better look on the monitor, a wave of BO rose up. Three and a half days in a confined space was long enough to really get to know people so no one really noticed.
“Wow, I am pumped to hit the beach on that baby” Matteo excitedly announced. Matteo was a scrawny Hispanic guy with an unfocused mind and an active lifestyle. Like he had trouble sitting down. Not even sitting still, just sitting down. This voyage was basically his worst nightmare.
“As if we will have any free time. We got drafted so… yeah I doubt you will be able to find time to surf” Katherine sharply quipped back at him. She was… interesting. Basically, she had a strong opinion on everything. Despite having grown up a Premier, she apparently found our political landscape a “joke”. Needless to say, she generally preferred solitude over our company on this flight.
“Quite.” McCroy briskly interrupted our chatter from the cockpit. “We are about to enter the atmosphere. Buckle up it could get rough”. A sudden tremble shuddered through the ship, reinforcing his order.
We fell into our seats, upright position ready for reentry. The lone monitor displayed the heat shield refracting the frictional heat of breaking through the atmosphere. Occasionally bright flares would be shown from the shield disrupting objects larger than a few atoms. The ship shuddered again this time rougher. And again. A glass fell from its hiding place amongst the drawers and smashed into pieces on the ships wall. Another sudden spurt of turbulence caught the shards and flung them in the air and toward the cockpit.
Before I could even begin yelling, the shards were in the cockpit, burying themselves in flesh and computer alike. In a daze, I saw the Corporal’s hand fly to his neck where a piece of glass was embedded. As blood began to pour between his fingers, he turned to us in his final act and calmly stated, “Abandon ship, I have been critically wounded and the controls appear to be damaged beyond use.” Pausing for a slow breath, he continued, “Unless one of y’all isn’t useless and can repair a state of the art machine do that, otherwise grab the emergency parachutes in the back and have fun skydiving.”
“Not without you Sir.” I retorted as I clumsily tore my restraints off and tried to make my way to the front.
“Stop! Save yourselves. I am not going to make it” He yelled at me as his skin paled. “Go now! That is an ord..” He trailed off falling forward in his chair.
“McCroy!” I screamed. Angry at the unbelievable misfortune that has happened. How in the world does a glass crash a plane?
“Jason, come with me. He is probably gone and if we don’t leave we will be too” Matteo said as he grabbed my arm and started pulling me to the rear where the other recruits were pulling out the parachutes. Katherine tossed me a package; it was the parachute. But it had no determinable way to put it on, was it magnetic?
“Place it on your chest!” Katherine screamed when I looked at her questioningly. Annoyed she knew what to do, I slapped it on my chest.
“What the..!” slipped out of my mouth as the package expanded across my body. After a few seconds it had formed a full suit with a small bulge on the back. Huh neat. Scary and creepy but cool.
“The door won’t open!!” Jackson screamed as he tried to push the door open. Besides him Ella was fervently messing with the control panel and out of options desperately began pounding on the panel. “The controls are not working!”
With that announcement everyone began muttering and talking trying to solve the problem with chatter. Overwhelmed by our trapped situation, I left the arguing behind and headed to the cockpit. With Matteo behind me, we made our way to the control panel. It was a mess several panels had been smashed and others torn apart. IT was an incredible amount of damage for a glass’ worth of shards. Especially considering some of the pieces hit Corporal McCroy. Wait. McCroy.
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
I rushed over his body and checked his pulse.
“Is he there?” Matteo asked
“I don’t think so.. Wait yeah I felt something!” I excitedly responded.
Matteo stepped forward and slapped one of the suit packages on and we watched as it crept across his body and effectively bandaged the wound. With him reasonably taken care of, we dragged his solid frame back to the exit hatch. By now the other recruits had resorted to all pounding on the door and kicking the control panel with a few recruits sitting off to the side ‘staring of into space as silent tears slid down their faces.
“Shut up!” I scream to get their attention. It didn’t work. Desperate times call for desperate measures, so I grab the Corporal’s service pistol from his holster, and praying it doesn’t send ricochet everywhere, I fire the old six-shooter into an empty room.
“Bang!” Everyone stops and stares at me. 14 sets of frightened eyes waiting to see what I wanted.
“Stop panicking! We are better than this. We are Gifted. Let us find a way to survive without running around like our heads are cut off! We don’t have much time until we crash, can anyone control their Gift enough to get us out?” I desperately asked in an attempt to beat death.
“If someone has some explosive plant seeds on them I can help, otherwise no.” Ella sarcastically responded.
“How do you release your Gift? I have no clue what I can do” Matteo asked.
“Honestly, I don’t really know how to explain it. It feels like I’m pushing some type of energy out, but it is natural. Like using a leg to stand up. You kinda build up an inner pressure and then release it I guess.”
“Guess I’ll try that then” Matteo stated as he moved to the hatch. After a few moments he released a defeated breath of air and dejectedly moved out of the way.
Curious I moved to the hatch and place my hands on the edges. Breathe. Build up the energy and push it out. Easy. Except it wasn’t. There was nothing to push nothing to move. Dejected I angrily tensed and tried one final angry mental flex. And there was something. A spark of energy. I coaxed it from its hiding spot and brought it towards my center. This is incredible! Nearly forgetting my time limit, I hurried to try and expand my inner spark until it grew in size. Then I pushed it through my hands.
“Boooom” An accompanying blast tore through my hands and everything turned black.
“Beep. Beep.”
A bright light filtered into my shut eyes. Closing them completely, I slowly opened them to adjust to my surroundings. I am laying on a stark white bench. Dressed in white undergarments. Fashionable. In rows past me, the rest of the recruits are stirring and finding themselves in the same situation.
“Congratulation recruits! You have managed to do something no other batch of intakes has ever managed. You managed to all die before crashing into the ground” Corporal McCroy’s voice boomed out from a doorway.
“While you did attempt to save me, you ultimately failed in an explosive fashion.” He taunted. “I would like to congratulate Recruit Jason for accessing his gift and taking control of the situation. However, in his attempt to open the hatch he used his gift and released an incredible amount of energy which succeeded in blasting a path to freedom. Unfortunately for y’all, the energy released also rebounded off the hatch and incinerated every single one of you instantly and finished Jason off moments later. So, Congrats. Jason is the first recruit to have single handily killed every other recruit. Lets give him a round of applause.” McCroy joked.
“CLAP”
Everyone turned to glare at me.
“CLAP”
No one was quite sure what had happened, but everyone knew I had messed it up for them. Great.
“CLAP”
*****
Further into the depths of the Academy, a figure clothed in an ornate red and black robe hunched over a monitor replaying the latest batch of recruits’ introductory simulation.
When he finished watching Jason’s explosive power decimate the ship, he rewound the scene. Again. And again.
“How is this possible?” The robed man asked in a gravelly voice.
“Apparently his power was strong enough to not only work out that he was inside a simulation but to affect the coding, so it could manifest inside their scenario.” The response came from a figure hidden in the dark corner of the room.
Corporal McCory stepped from the shadows into the light streaming off the monitor. “Needless to say, Jason is now our most promising recruit. I have never had another recruit bring their Gift into the simulation. Much less have one do it without even understanding his Gift.”
“Keep an eye on him” came the rough response.
“Yes, General” McCroy saluted and exited with his new orders.
*****